Archives for April 2019

Habitat and Westminster

April 18, 2019 by Kate Brinkley

Westminster church currently has two service opportunities with Habitat for Humanity. Our crew of builders meets on the second Saturday of the month to work on homes in various stages of construction. Habitat’s model of late is to build clusters of duplexes and even six-plexes in Charlottesville, to help with land acquisition costs and promote in-fill. Currently the building activity is located at Harmony Ridge, off 5th Street South, where ten families will move in later this fall.

The builders partner with other Presbyterian congregations in the area to form a group of typically 15 workers. Thanks to Westminster’s builders within the past year: Aurora Nichols, John Kleinschmidt, Ron Wiley, Noah Oakland, Winston Harmon, Colin Lee, Sage Bradburn, and Steve Wilson. Contact Steve if interested in participating.

At the same time, Westminster is hosting Community Conversations, a monthly community-building effort with the families that will occupy the homes of Harmony Ridge. Billie Best coordinates a meal for the 60 some Habitat families, Habitat staff, and volunteers who gather. After dinner, the adults work with staff members to create a shared set of values for the new neighborhood. Lucy Burnette and Carolyn Brown lead activities designed to help children become friends before they become neighbors. And, Kathy Stacy heads up child care for the youngest. Over 25 Westminster folks join these four to form a caring loving team. Thank you to all!

Providing Shelter Panel for Adult Education Class

April 15, 2019 by Kate Brinkley

The Benevolence Committee is pleased to have five groups who provide Shelter in our community where it is very difficult to find affordable decent housing. Westminster has been involved with and supporting these organizations, some for years. The panel for adult education class is on Sunday, April 14. Please join us for brief presentations on what each is currently doing, and to follow with discussion.AIM: Alliance for Interfaith Ministries provides temporary emergency assistance to families threatened with homelessness, loss of power or fuel, or other temporary financial crises. They seek to keep families from being evicted or losing their electricity, to provide access to much needed medical care, and to help with essential living and work-related expenses. Roughly 95% of the clients referred to AIM are families living below the poverty line.

AIM is a coalition that receives financial support from 34 congregations, including Westminster, in the City of Charlottesville & Albemarle County.

The Haven is open daily with breakfast, laundry, showers, personal box, living room area, computers and works with several agencies and programs to connect guests to the resources they need to find housing and stabilize their lives. The Haven offers housing support and assistance through Housing First programs. Guests are eligible for rental assistance if: they are at risk of needing to stay in a shelter within the next 14 days, OR are literally homeless (living on the street, in an emergency shelter, in a vehicle, or another place not intended for habitation).

Building Goodness Foundation (BGF) builds for nonprofits which work to improve health, education, and economic outcomes in impoverished communities, both in the U.S. and abroad. These nonprofit partners receive a custom-built facility or renovation which boosts their ability to serve their community, at lower than market cost. BGF builds to improve shelters from locally Barrett Early Learning Center to 900 families in Haiti who now have a home when they were formerly homeless or living in a tent. This also includes 35,400 patients each year who are seen at BGF-built medical clinics and 1,977 students each year who attend a BGF-built school.

Habitat for Humanity brings people together to build and rebuild homes and communities while catalyzing new pathways to safe, decent, affordable housing. There is the construction where the individual or family who will benefit work on building their own houses as well as other houses and in the end have no interest mortgage loans and there is the building of community for a new neighborhood. Westminster has been involved for many years In constructing homes and in the last year also in building relationships between people who will be living together in a neighborhood. Future neighbors are bought together for meals and play to build relationships and a strong sustainable neighborhood.

Piedmont Housing Alliance creates affordable housing opportunities and fosters community through education, lending, and equitable development. Their education efforts focus on counseling for home ownership and to build family financial stability. This includes HUD-approved housing counseling program of one-on-one coaching and group classes for home buying, credit improvement, debt reduction, savings programs, fair housing and foreclosure prevention. Lending to help individual homebuyers with down payment and closing cost assistance and for affordable housing development projects throughout the city and five counties of the Thomas Jefferson Planning District. They also acquire and rehabilitate and/or renovate existing properties and develop new affordable rental housing, which they often manage, and produce affordable single family housing through neighborhood revitalization efforts.

We are looking forward to this opportunity to explore the providing of shelter in our community where we know it is very difficult, pricey, and there is little vacancy.

Respectfully submitted,
Kobby Hoffman on behalf of the Benevolence Committee

Special Congregational Meeting on May 5

April 2, 2019 by Kate Brinkley

A Special Congregational Meeting is called for Sunday, May 5, 2019, to elect Elders and Deacons for the Class of 2022, to elect a Nominating Committee, to amend the WPC Congregational Manual, and for other business purposes. The meeting will take place immediately after the 11:00 AM worship service, which will be shortened to accommodate the meeting.This year’s Nominating Committee, co-chaired by Candace Spence and Will Hochstetler, will present the slate of nominees for new members of the Session, the Board of Deacons, and next year’s Nominating Committee. The new members will assume their duties in mid-June.

The proposed amendment to the Congregational Manual would change the date of the Annual Congregational Meeting from the third to the fourth Sunday in January. Read more . . .

. . . At its February meeting, the Session approved the following motion: That Session propose to the Congregation, in accord with Section XI of the Congregational Manual (2013), an amendment to Section III of the Manual to read: “The Annual Meeting of the Congregation shall be called by the Session and will ordinarily be held on the fourth Sunday of January.” This date change would allow much-needed additional time between the January Session meeting (second Sunday of January) and the Congregational Meeting for the preparation of the financial and other reports that are submitted to the congregation. In recent years, the Stewardship Campaign has extended well into December, delaying Session’s approval of an Operating Budget until its January meeting. Allowing only one week between the Session and the Congregational Meeting has created a difficult and stressful “crunch time” for our Staff and Session Elders—especially those involved with church finances. Adding another week in between the two meetings would go a long way to alleviating this situation.

Therefore, the question presented for congregational vote will be: Shall Section III of the WPC Congregational Manual be amended to read: “The Annual Meeting of the Congregation shall be called by the Session and will ordinarily be held on the fourth Sunday of January”?
Please come to the meeting! Thank you—Nadine Roddy, Stated Clerk of Session 2018-19

Relevant Document Provisions

From the WPC Congregational Manual:

III. Meetings of the Congregation (G-1.0501)

The Annual Meeting of the Congregation shall be called by the Session and will ordinarily be held on the third Sunday of January. At that meeting, the following business may be transacted:

Annual Reports
Election of Church Nominating Committee
Election of Ruling Elders and/or Deacons
Election of Trustees
Calling a Pastor, co-Pastor or associate Pastor
Changing existing pastoral relationships by reviewing and approving (or declining to approve) changes to the terms of the call for the Installed Pastor(s).
Receipt of the church’s annual budget for informational purposes.

XI. Amendments to the Congregational Rules

These Rules may be amended by a majority vote of the members present and voting, providing that the proposed changes shall have been distributed at the same time as the call of the meeting at which the changes are voted upon.
From the Book of Order (2017-19):

G-1.0501 Annual and Special Meetings

The congregation shall hold an annual meeting and may hold special meetings as
necessary, for any or all of the purposes appropriate for congregational consideration.
The business to be transacted at special meetings shall be limited to items specifically
listed in the call for the meeting.

All active members of the congregation present at either annual or special meetings
are entitled to vote. Congregations shall provide by rule the quorum necessary to conduct
business.

Archives for April 2019

Habitat and Westminster

Providing Shelter Panel for Adult Education Class

Special Congregational Meeting on May 5

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